South Maui Bike Path

KIHEI GREENWAY

An excellent choice for families and beginning bicyclists, this flat one-mile greenway along Liloa Street features night time lighting and offers an easy way to travel between the Kihei Regional Park/Lokelani Intermediate School and E. Waipuilani Road.Maui County recently completed Phase 2 of this greenway. It included a half mile stretch along Liloa Street between Kihei Elementary School and Lokelani Intermediate School/Kihei Regional Park. The cost was $2 million.

Updates and News:

Kihei Community Association has been a longtime champion of this greenway. (Read more.)

The County has commissioned a study to develop Phase 3, which will extend the Kihei Greenway along Liloa Street between Waipuilani Road and Namanu Street. The biggest challenge is to design a reasonable way to cross the gulch at Welakahao Road. Kihei Community Association reports that they have had constant contact with Public Works Department Director David Goode and his team, who have been very supportive of this project.

According to Kihei Community Association, the department saw an example of a recently erected and almost completed pedestrian bridge in Kaua’i that is narrower than what will be needed for federal standards for a bike path, and with a shorter span (about 75′). That bridge cost about $330,000 as it exists now.

Kihei Community Association reports that the estimated cost of a bike path bridge over the gulch is about $250,000 plus installation. The bridge appears to be the most cost effective way of crossing the gulch. The bike bridge would be a permanent feature, and would not be replaced when Liloa Street is extended to Welakahao Road. (The bike path is being constructed before the road, ensuring it will be permanent once built.)

Their next step for the design team is to get the results of a traffic study that would determine what kind of an intersection at Liloa and Welakahao will likely be in the future, which would determine how the bike bridge would tie into it. Kihei Community Association is pushing for a roundabout at this intersection. That study is expected to be completed in less than a year.

Get updates and latest developments at Kihei Community Association’s website at gokihei.org and by following Maui Bicycling League on Facebook.